


Bloody, Unbowed

by bestworstcase (windrattlestheblinds)



Series: Cass Appreciation Week 2020 [5]
Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon), Tangled (2010)
Genre: Cassandra Appreciation Week, Cassandra’s Revenge, Gen, Missing Scene, Not Canon Compliant, Oneshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-05-19
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:34:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24263662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windrattlestheblinds/pseuds/bestworstcase
Summary: Cassandra falls. Zhan Tiri picks her back up.
Relationships: Cassandra & Zhan Tiri
Series: Cass Appreciation Week 2020 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1746052
Comments: 10
Kudos: 43





	Bloody, Unbowed

**Author's Note:**

> Day 6: Fight/Battle. 
> 
> I'm posting this a day early because of the remaining three fics, this one comes first chronologically and is the point in the series where my plans for a nice, simple, canon-compliant set of oneshots went violently off the rails. :D Also, my fics for Day 5 and Day 7 are going to be delayed, probably until the weekend, because they're rather long and won't be finished to my satisfaction on schedule.

Distant voices.

_(“That was awesome!”_

_“Varian—?!”_

_“Is everyone alright?”_

_“Let’s… let’s go home.”)_

And pain.

Fracturing over the stone in fractal webs; shattered glass; a mirror, dripping blood. Breathing hurts. She coughs, and flecks the blackness with red. How long she lies on the spur of rock that saved her from a greater fall—

Her hands— curling, uncurling against the silence. The opal seared and branded into her chest, spitting light, bleeding light—

But she—

she will not die whimpering in the dirt.

Cassandra pushes herself onto her forearms. Her head swims. Lights pop in her eyes and burrow into darkness; bruised. The long train of Rapunzel’s hair worms golden over the ground, far below. She watches them leave with blurry discontent. And shame.

_Failure is not an…_

Everything aches.

She crawls to the side of the tower and drags herself to her feet.

She climbs.

She didn’t fall far, though in the heart-stopping eternity before reflex yanked her ledge out of the tower it felt that way. A dozen feet, if that.

But it hurts, it _hurts;_ every trembling clutch at the ragged stone, every precarious foothold, every shuddering breath scraping out of her chest, flavored with blood and ice. Her pulse rings in her ears and the opal screams, the opal screams, the opal—

When she curls her fingers over the top of tower, her limbs feel like liquid fire; Cassandra dangles there, shaking with the effort of _holding on_ while she tries to dredge up the strength to pull herself over the edge. Exhausted tears smear her vision into shades of blue and black and red.

A hand clasps her wrist.

_(Long slender fingers; gloved in black silk. A grip like steel.)_

She is lifted smoothly through her foggy surprise; her legs fold gently beneath her when her feet settle against the cracked floor, and she slumps into the ruins while her—rescuer—swims in and out of focus.

_That smile._

A cat’s smile; a smile curved like the scythe of the moon dwindling toward the horizon.

Familiar on a stranger’s face.

The woman is gaunt and sallow; pale hair and ebon skirts rippling in the wind as she prowls away from Cass and wends a path through the scattered rubble. “Hello, Cassandra,” she croons _(and her voice is the same; chimes fading into a growl; serrated and sweet)_. “I believe we’re overdue a _proper_ introduction, mm?”

“Y- you—” Cassandra clutches at the cracked opal, dizzy with pain as she sinks to the floor. Sparks spray between her fingers in erratic spurts. White. _Blue_. “—you’re the- the spirit from—”

“From Tromus’ little… lobster pot, yes,” the woman—the spirit— _(her friend)_ says, with a light chuckle. “And…?”

Darkness feathers in her peripherals; air shudders in and out of her lungs in ragged gasps. Her head pounds. She feels sick and cold and weary to the bone; and there is… in her mind, in her flesh, there’s an _itch—_

The woman stoops to pluck something from the ground and holds it to the sky. It glints a glacial blue in the starlight; and Cassandra whimpers as the moonstone _twangs_.

“You’re…”

 _(Don’t you_ know? _)_

It— stutters, splashes up out of the depths of her mind; flakes of dreams forgotten and inklings she ignored. Terror paints itself across the tower in shards of livid red, and in that bloody light she can see vines crawling from the cracks; the gnarled roots of a strangler fig.

The woman smiles with all her teeth.

“…you’re Zhan Tiri.”

Cassandra scrabbles away until the emptiness beyond the ledge of the tower opens at her back; until a shadowy tendril snakes out from beneath the hem of _the demon’s_ skirts and hooks around her ankle, tugging her back. The moonstone sears; her vision floods white and _crackles_.

Zhan Tiri closes her eyes with a blissful sigh as she kneels beside Cass. “Yes,” she murmurs, fervent. “It’s _good_ to be back.”

“You— y- you—"

“Hush.” More vines slither out of the shadows, coiling around Cassandra’s wrists and peeling her hands away from the opal; Cass thrashes against them, gasping as the tower flickers red again, and the demon _tsk_ s gently. “Lie still, Cassandra. You’re in no condition to struggle.”

“Don’t touch m—”

She chokes off with a howl as Zhan Tiri’s hand flicks down; a spark of blue a _snap_ like breaking glass a sharp _stab_ through the moonstone; a needle of ice threaded through her heart.

And the pain stops.

Cassandra droops into the sudden silence of it, blinking. There’s a strange, squirming feeling where the demon’s palm presses against her chest; and cool relief trickling into her veins as the power of the moonstone settles. Every ache, every sting, every burn, _gone._

“There. That’s better, isn’t it?”

Zhan Tiri smiles. Cassandra sucks in a shaky breath and lets it rattle out of her lungs again, too dazed to react when the vines binding her limbs uncurl and slide away.

“…Wh- what did you do?”

“I did warn you that you would lose a direct contest of strength,” Zhan Tiri murmurs. She takes Cassandra’s hands and coaxes her up; Cass, stumbling, allows the demon to guide her to the steps of her broken throne. “When Rapunzel threaded the full power of the sundrop through the moonstone, it fractured; I simply… mended it.”

The stairs rise up. Cassandra collapses onto them, listing away from the demon. 

(Zhan Tiri. She’s spent the past year befriending _Zhan Tiri.)_

“Oh, Cassandra, there’s no need to feel so horrified.” Zhan Tiri settles beside her, drumming her fingertips against the stone. “You heeded my advice and sympathized with my plight while you could still cling to the comforting fiction of a lost identity—” her smile slices the dark, and Cass shrinks away, shuddering “—and now nothing has changed but that you’ve grown beyond the need for any masks.”

“N- _no._ ”

“Oh, yes.” She smooths the inky fabric of her skirts with relish (and Cassandra _hates_ how she recognizes the slight upward lift in the corners of her mouth as a smile of real, pure enjoyment) and continues, her voice honeyed, “I won’t stop you from crawling back to Rapunzel, Cassandra, if that’s what you truly want; I’m sure she’ll welcome you, provided you grovel enough and surrender the moonstone—”

“ _No—!_ ”

“Mmm. You see?”

The wind blows with a bitterness; the last gasp of winter. She stares at the demon, and the demon smiles fondly at her.

“We are so alike, you and I,” Zhan Tiri murmurs. “A tree, a tower; swords and storms… rage against those who hurt us. You may as well embrace it.”

A tremor races down her spine.

(She… had known. Some part of her _had known._ )

Cassandra grips the opal, running her thumb over the smooth curve of it; the ragged new fault lines, and the faint heat of Zhan Tiri’s magic holding the pieces together.

_it sparks; an emerald cascade._

“You— said. That failure wasn’t an option,” she whispers.

And she failed. She _lost;_ cast from her fortress, her power shattered but for the intervention of a _demon._

“You haven’t failed. Rapunzel—” in the depths of Zhan Tiri's pupils, pinprick green; flaring brighter with a cruel, sly mirth “—left her enemies alive behind her. I think you know what happens next.”

A battle.

_Not the war._

Cassandra rubs her eyes, shivering. She—

shouldn’t even _consider_

—but.

(She _knew,_ in the bitter black corners of her heart. The threadbare story the spirit spun for her in the Dark Kingdom never had much weight; and she swallowed it because she wanted to, not because she _believed._ )

“You… lied to me,” she says, slow. “But… you didn’t… trick me, into anything. I- I…”

Walked into Corona with her eyes wide open; attacked the princess and kidnapped Varian and stole Demanitus’ scroll; built her tower and provoked a battle.

 _Lost_ a battle.

“I would do it again,” Cassandra whispers, with a fervor that startles her. Her hands fall into her lap, curling fists; the image of Rapunzel aglow with magic flashes unbidden behind her eyes.

_(Let—him—go!)_

Rage crawls up her throat so thick and icy she could choke on it; and it glazes over her fear with a thick layer of frosty determination. _I will win this war._

Jerkily, she lifts her chin and looks Zhan Tiri in the eye. The demon. _Her friend._ (The only one who has ever _believed_ in her.)

“Where do we start?”


End file.
